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Malice Domestic, held every year in North Bethesda, Maryland, is one of my very favorite conventions. It feels like a giant family reunion, in the best way, because these are all my chosen family. This year was particularly special for many reasons, one being that The Weekend Retreat took home the Agatha Award teapot for Best Contemporary Novel! I was stunned, I will tell you. And enormously grateful.

During one of her toastmaster speeches, Lori Rader-Day was talking about how special Malice was to her, and how she often talks to people about “Malice Moments.” I love that term, because I do always feel as though I experience those kinds of magical interactions, happenings, serendipitous times that make the conference so special.

This year, my favorite Malice Moment might’ve been the live auction. I donated a signed copy of The Weekend Retreat, a bottle of wine from the Finger Lakes region (TWR is set in the Finger Lakes), and signed copies of the maps that my son Dash drew for my novel. As I was coming back from dinner on Friday night, I started getting text messages from people about how the bidding for my item was going–very well, it turns out! Let’s just say there was a VERY GENEROUS donation to KEEN, the charity that benefited from the auction. And that donation was all because of Dash’s drawings. (No one likes me that much.)

But it was so fun to see how excited Dash was to have his drawings be so popular, and lovely to be able to help send funds toward a great cause. Truly a Malice Moment!

I enjoyed catching up with many friends and attending some wonderful panels. I was also excited to be the moderator of an excellent panel based on my What Scares You Q&A series, and my panelists Carol Goodman, Tracy Clark, Lori Rader-Day, and Alexia Gordon made it all worthwhile.

Now, back to reality. Sigh. But looking forward already to next year’s Malice!

The Weekend Retreat has been out for two months now, and I just want to express my gratitude to everyone who has helped make it a success and/or read the book. Thank you to all the bookstores and influencers and podcasters who invited me to talk about the book or helped share it. Thank you to the libraries who are carrying copies of the book on their shelves. Thank you to the book clubs who are reading my novel! Thank you to friends and family who’ve been telling their friends and family about the book. Word of mouth is so powerful! I’m so grateful to folks for doing this.

I’m thrilled to announce that my third novel The Weekend Retreat is one of five finalists for the Agatha Award for Best Contemporary Novel. Agathas are presented each year at the Malice Domestic convention in Bethesda, Maryland.

This is particularly exciting because I share this honor with four amazing writers–Ellen Byron for Wined and Died in New Orleans; Annette Dashofy for Helpless; Korina Moss for Case of the Bleus; and Gigi Pandian for The Raven Thief.

The Agathas winners will be announced on Saturday, April 27 at Malice Domestic.

My third novel of suspense, The Weekend Retreat, is releasing on December 26, 2023! If you want to pre-order a copy as a gift for the book lover in your life, or if you want a copy for yourself as an end-of-year treat, now’s a great time to snatch it up!

There’s free stuff waiting for you if you pre-order.

1. My publisher is hosting an amazing contest right up to the day before publication. If you pre-order a copy and upload proof of purchase here, they will enter you in a drawing to win a Kindle (loaded with my two previous novels!)
2. If you want to give the book as a gift for the holidays and need something to wrap up or put in a card, I’ve got you covered. Download this PDF and print it out!
3. Finally, if you email me your proof of purchase from now through December 25, 2023, I will send you a sheet of wine stickers and a cute tiny bookmark (while supplies last…U.S. mailing addresses only.)

My publisher HTP Books’ Book Clubbish community is hosting a pre-order giveaway now through October 31, 2023, for my next novel The Weekend Retreat. (Coming December 26, 2023.) Pre-order your copy and you can enter to win a Kindle loaded with my previous two novels, The Mother Next Door and One Night Gone! (And a brand-new Kindle–don’t forget that!)

To enter, pre-order The Weekend Retreat from anywhere you buy books, then visit Book Clubbish to fill out your entry form and upload proof of purchase. Then watch your email to see if you were the lucky winner!

Thanks so much for your support, and best of luck!

Pre-order The Weekend Retreat here:

Enter the giveaway here:

Today marks one year that The Mother Next Door has been out in the wilds of the world. Thank you so much to everyone who bought, read, borrowed, listened, reviewed, added to their massive to-read list, used as a doorstop, or fed to their dog. I so appreciate your support!

Thank you to my publisher Graydon House for getting this story out into the hands of readers, and to the excellent editors, designers, publicists and marketing teams for keeping me line and making the book shine. (Especially you, Melanie Fried.) And a special shout-out to my audiobook narrators Andi Arndt, Teri Schnaubelt, and Emily Lawrence for bringing my narrators to life.

And if you have not yet gotten your hands on a copy, this is the perfect month to spend some time with the Ivy Five! Get your Halloween fix right-o here.

This past weekend, I got to be around other writers again in person for the first time in a long time. My husband Art Taylor, our son Dash, and I traveled to Alabama for back-to-back crime fiction festivals—Murder in the Magic City in Birmingham and Murder on the Menu in Wetumpka, which is an annual fundraiser for the Friends of the Wetumpka Library.

It was good for the soul in many ways—from meeting new writers and seeing some old writer friends to hearing from readers and librarians who read and enjoyed my books. Margaret Fenton, Joan Kennedy, Beverly Leboeuf, and Tammy Lynn, our hosts for the weekend, were warm and welcoming and thoughtful. And everyone involved was so kind to our son Dash, who had a blast.

Some highlights from the weekend included:

• Getting to interview my husband Art Taylor, and in turn, having him interview me, as guests of honor at Murder in the Magic City. I actually learned some new things about him, believe it or not!
• All the funny and witty things authors said on their panels, such as Mary Dutta’s tendency to use the name “Carl” for all the bad guys in her stories. (For me, “Jack” tends to be my go-to male name, and I often need to go back and change it.)
• When the librarians at Wetumpka Public Library introduced themselves and said how much they loved One Night Gone and The Mother Next Door. It was so lovely to hear, and so wonderful to get that support. They are all now official members of The Ivy Five, so if you stop by the library and see everyone wearing green ivy leaf pins, you know why!
• The Tequila Sunrise drink the bartender at our hotel made me. It. Was. Divine.
• Seeing Dash interact with everyone, chatting about anything from architecture to haunted houses. I think he was more popular than we were, which is how it should be.
• Visiting Birmingham’s Museum of Modern Art and browsing a very cool used bookstore, where Dash got to touch a 500-year-old book!

Here are a few photos from the weekend. I hope we get to go back sometime! It was truly a memorable weekend.

Note: This essay first appeared in the Sisters in Crime We Love Bookstores newsletter in August 2021.

When I was asked by Reads & Company owners Robb Cadigan and Jason Hafer in 2019 if I’d consider coming to their store for an event for my debut novel One Night Gone, I didn’t even hesitate. I said yes immediately. I’d heard great things about the store, which had just opened at the time, and, having known Robb for years from seeing him at various writers’ conferences, I knew he would take good care of his authors. Phoenixville, PA, is several hours from our home in Washington, D.C., but my husband and son and I decided we’d make a weekend of it. It was then that we got the most delightful surprise. Turns out that there’s an apartment above the bookstore that Robb and Jason allow out-of-town authors to stay in—for free—if they are doing an event at the store. A cozy little apartment? Above a bookstore? Packed with books and games? Um, yes please! 

It was then that we got the most delightful surprise. Turns out that there’s an apartment above the bookstore that Robb and Jason allow out-of-town authors to stay in—for free—if they are doing an event at the store. A cozy little apartment? Above a bookstore? Packed with books and games? Um, yes please!

A great perk, for sure, but the true delight of Reads & Company is the people who run it and their love for books and authors. Robb and Jason and their booksellers treat their customers and the authors who visit like family. From the second you walk into the store—which is one long brightly lit room stretching long—you want to stay and browse and read and chat. They also make sure their shelves are packed with diverse titles, local authors and interests, and the latest and greatest titles. Oh, and did I mention they really love crime fiction?

Reads & Company just celebrated their second anniversary in June 2021, but they’ve already got a loyal local fanbase. And I can see why—the store is managed and run by people who truly love authors and books. So, the next time you’re in the Philadelphia area, stop by and see them. And please tell them Tara sent you.

I got some wonderful mail this afternoon–advance copies of The Mother Next Door, my second suspense novel. Weirdly, the box started twitching—those books REALLY wanted to come out.

Coming October 12, 2021! Pre-order your copy now!

Friends, I need to chat for a moment about edits.

I heard a lot about the dreaded second book. How hard it is to write. The worries about if it be as good as your first book. The pressures of writing to a deadline if you have a contract.

I believed all those warnings, I did. But I don’t think I was prepared for just how hard it would be.

It didn’t help that on top of a deadline and performance pressure we were hit with a deadly global pandemic. A fraught presidential election and insurrection. Countless examples of racial injustice. Writing fiction at times felt both pointless and frivolous when so many others were suffering so badly.

But write I did. I crafted an outline, with the help of my agent and editor, and went for it. I thought it would be so much easier this time with a road map. I knocked out 70,000 words and a rough first draft in about six months.

And then we figured out that the book wasn’t working at all. I tried to resist it at first, but alas, it just wasn’t fixable. I cried. I threw things. I said some mean and snotty things about myself.

And then I sucked it up and tossed it all out and started again.

But now I was severely behind in my timeline. No one else seemed to think this was a problem. My agent and editor were like, “Oh, you got this. No worries.” My husband was like, “You’ll be fine.” I was like: “HOLY SHIT I’M DOOMED THIS IS NEVER GOING TO WORK I’M MOVING TO A REMOTE ISLAND AND HIDING UNDER A BLANKET FOR FOREVER.”

But then I sucked it up and started writing. Again. And again I got about 10,000 words in and realized I needed to change the point of view.

I cried. I threw things. I said mean and nasty things about myself.

You can sense the cycle here. Needless to say, it never really got easier. I did finally find the POV I needed. The story got tighter and tenser and more suspenseful. I threw in some crazy stuff that I love–like Halloween, like creepy urban legends, like cultish friend groups. I cursed some more and cried some more and all through it my editor, my agent, my husband, my friends were like, “You’ve got this.”

(Moral of the story here: Surround yourself with some good people.)

I wrote another 70,000 words. More than that, if you count all the scenes I threw out. I edited those words. I edited it more. And again and again. My eyeballs fell out of my head a few times. I had to start PT for my shoulder and neck issues. I haven’t watched much TV in a year unless you count Murder, She Wrote (and you should always count Murder, She Wrote.)

And this morning I finally turned in the book for galleys. It will still go through copy editing and proof reading, and yes, I’ll have more edits to do. But it’s there, it’s done. People will read it. (Hopefully some will like it).

I. Did. It.

But yeah, what they say is true. Writing the second book really sucks.

The Mother Next Door, my second novel, will be out October 12, 2021 from Graydon House Books. You can pre-order it now!